/diy/ - Do It Yourself

what sort of land or plot of land should i be looking for?

>>785149
>>785154

>starts a general
>doesn't include any links or OC
>expects to be spoonfed

A basic house it just a 2x4 frame layed in plywood, primer, corrugated metal and more primer and a topcoat of paint. All on top of a concrete base.

OP it's clear that you have no idea what the fuck you're doing so you should just stop while you're ahead before you start burning money and time. If you need a starting point, go to Barnes & Nobel and find a book on carpentry in their DIY/self help section and git gud.

The thing is, if you build a house without properly planning it your town/county clerk will red tag it and tell you to tear it down. Likewise, an improperly built house (especially electrical work) can lead to a fire.

tl;dr you're not going to get any help from /diy/ on this. If you want into carpentry you have to do it yourself, hence why this board is called /diy/ - do it yourself.

it takes years of actually doing this stuff to even have half a clue of what you're doing

>>785161
Well, that or a good manual and a shit ton of time and money on hand to make up for the mistakes you will make.

>>785171
I don't know of any singular manual that would walk someone through all of the intricacies of building a house, let alone all of the legal hoops to jump through, electrical, plumbing, etc.

>>785149
>whats the easiest method?
a SWA hut style house is pretty fucking easy.

>dig a bunch of holes in a line
>set metal mounting brackets
>fill with concrete
>attach 4x4 posts
>use a dumpy level and chop off the posts to the same height
>construct floor joists/sub floor
>frame in walls
>build and mount roof truss
>skin your roof
>finish work, electrical, plumbing.

when i was in the military, my crew could build a finished, to-code residence in a day.

>>785149
20' Shipping container (for that small house effect) with pallet furniture. Bury it and add solar panels on top for free energy. Plumbing not necessary, save piss for water.

>>785186

>Bury it and add solar panels on top for free energy.

this is a joke op shipping containers don't have the structural support to be buried without retaining walls

also, a plastic shed is probably cheaper than a shipping container

>>785188
but is a plastic shed underground?

>>785188
Cause a pos suncoast shed would be better than a shipping container.

how do you all feel about cinder block homes or concrete homes
i like this. reading up on SWA huts :D >>785180

>>785188
>this is a joke op shipping containers don't have the structural support to be buried without retaining walls

So the bit where is should save his piss for water is serious?

>>785159
i refused to acknowledge that the town/county clerk has any say in what i build on my property

im seeing a lot of nice housing options for concrete that are not complicated

>>785149
Building Construction Illustrated - 4th Edition.pdf

>>785214
You can refuse all you like, but if push comes to shove, they are the ones who can roll a D9 dozer over it if they deem it uninhabitable and a safety or health risk.

Similarly, if you don't meet utility requirements, the power company refuses your connection, the sewer people don't take your shit away, and you'll be stuck collecting rainwater for drinking.

Just things to keep in mind.

>>785225
thank you. yeah i plan on keeping it to code so i can have proper utilities. will keep that in mind

>>785225
Collecting rainwater is illegal in most parts of the US, so you're shit out of luck there too

>>785211
its expensive and a shitload more labor intesive. not to mention much less forgiving for a newbie working by himself.

unless you are living in a place thats prone to bad storms or tornados, i'd advise against it.

you could always go half n half with a couple courses of core filled CMU up to about waist high, and then frame the rest of your walls out on that.

but fuck trying to do windows and door jams. you are just asking for trouble.

>>785230
Come to California, its legal here. Tons of other weird construction methods are fine by code here too.

>>785230
Not all states, just shitty leftist ones like Colorado.
>>785225
Depends on where he is, not all counties have code enforcement. In mine the only rule they enforce is septic tank systems and they require a 5 dollar building permit. They do not ask what your building nor do they care. I also live in the sticks so it matters even less.

>>785214
>>785149
OP, please listen, i've actually built houses DIY, you can do most of the construction as the homeowner.

If you want to be able to sell the property, EVER, or for your kids, relatives to do anything with it after you die, then:

>Step 1: Contact a licensed architect and pay him a couple hundred bucks for real blueprints.
>Step 2: Get all the permits that the architect tells you to.

From here is where DIY advice begins. We can help you build your shit, even to code maybe, but if you don't start with the right paperwork you are shooting yourself in the foot. You, or your family will eventually lose all the effort you put in. You might get stuck with a condemn sticker, $2000 PER DAY fines until you fix a stupid problem, lawyer fees, all sorts of problems.

The #1 tenet of DIY is "do it yourself, BUT DO IT RIGHT"

If you want to play anarchist and build a house just to stick it to The Man, you're in the wrong place.

>>785287
Adding to what I just said, think of the couple of hundreds of bucks in fees for paperwork and applicable permits itself as DIY work. Since most richfags will pay a contractor to do that legwork for them, you're already Doing It Yourself.

It will be a negligible expense compared to the money you spend on materials building the thing.

It's sort of like buying a brand new car and refusing to change the oil, because $30 every couple of years is too big an expense. Be smart.

The ULTIMATE ANSWER= I T D E P E N D S...
local and state/federal building codes(must meet/satisfy or NOT CONSIDERED HOUSE)
build for location, don't build brick houses on sandy beaches/soil WITHOUT a solid foundation/aka bible story/aka lazy fucks didn't build their own foundation
PERMITS/LEGAL MUST BE MET, but seriously look at surrounding 50 miles for how others did things to reduce or get out of major costs. IE, don't tear that garage down, ADD ON TO IT(cheaper, less needs to be approved/qualified) and similar things.

>>785230
That's bat shit crazy, why?

In Australia it's pretty much law that you have to collect rainwater.

But on the topic of OP. Unless you live in a country where the building regulations are lax, building it from scratch is going to be a headache and a half.

I'm just finishing my building designer course in South Australia. To build a home (or even just add onto an existing home) you have to have plans, details, structural engineers, soil testing, all done and handed to the council before you even dig a hole on your land. Then after that there is a building code, the type of timber, the amount of timber, more structural engineers. Even just putting down the footings for the house requires a team of people. That's not even mentioning electrical and plumbing needs. If you truly want to build your own home, best spend a couple years learning, maybe take up a drafting/building design course while learning carpentry on the side. Homes are serious business, I didn't spend three years learning something someone could just pick up in a /DIY/ thread.

I built this house set up with a firepit and built the seats too, full electrical, two stories, a bed upstairs, heating and A/C, a tv, and wood floors, took like a month to build, small houses arent really that hard to make

>>785382
Summer pic is better

>>785383
>>785382
Did you need planning approval for that where you live?

>>785384
yeah, mostly because of gas and power lines underground but that was just a call to julie to mark where they were and then permits. fuckin permits man, but hey it was a fun project

>>785387
Haha sounds easy enough, down here even if you want to just put in a deck you have to submit the plans to council. Not only that but if you want to add anything on your property you have to update your WHOLE house to be up to the councils standards. So if you have an old house and the local council has updated their planning regulations, even if you want to just add a deck, your shit out of luck because you'll have to remodel your house to their specifications too.

>>785388
dont even start with me on decks, i cant build a deck over my patio for some bullshit reasons and my back patio is a giant cracked broken concrete slab, the fucking city wont let me DIY, it has to be some approved contractor or some bullshit. but at least i don't have to remodel the whole house... that must suck

>>785389
Yeah, it's a bit extreme, but it's for a good reason (sort of) the rules are in place so people don't build crazy shit in their back yard that effects the neighbours. I wouldn't want my neighbours building a 20 foot tall illuminated cock just because they can. But they have gotten a bit strict in the rules, especially in a lot of areas around me that are 'heritage areas' so every house has to have that old school look to them, can't build anything too modern and fancy.

>>785392
my neighbors love me because i help them build stuff, so now i might make a giant cock just because i can, thanks anon, now i have a new project, i just need to build a forge and then make the biggest cock ever

>>785399
Can make one of these, just make sure to have it hanging over their fence.

>>785217
Awful

>>785149
Polycarbonate torus built into the top of a hill.

OP: the easiest method (to understand) that I have seen is where you inflate a bag and then spray foamed concrete over it. The concrete cures into a dome.
There's other details involved but that is the main idea.

Some people just use the dome shape, and you get something that looks like Luke Skywalker's aunt & uncle's house. Other places build normal walls and then just use the dome process to make the roof.

These domes *can* span pretty big areas. A local high school built an addition using this method:
http://www.dalejtravis.com/barn/illinois/htm/il08205.htm
I do not know if there is any internal bracing for the dome roof, there may be--but I do know that they sprayed it in one step.

>>785233
>Come to California, its legal here. Tons of other weird construction methods are fine by code here too.
Usually in the USA, the two earthquake zones is where you can't use oddball construction like straw bales.
I live near the midwest-US earthquake fault, and there's a lot of housing code enforced around here. Hippy shit like rammed-earth doesn't exist here.

>>785379
Same reason we can't drink raw milk.
Nanny government is afraid someone could get sick.

So over the past few months, I've nurtured the idea that someday in the next few years I'll buy a plot of land and build a tiny house on it.
I just don't want to build a shitty wooden one on a trailer or out of a shipping container or some shit.

Then I saw an article about a hotel using horizontal sewer pipes as rooms in a park and thought it was awesome, but then I was enlightened online about how much space was wasted in the cylindrical space (round floor under bed wasted, all wall space, etc)

So I thought, what about turning it upright and planting it about 2 feet in the ground? Why couldn't I buy and deliver a concrete pipe to my land and plop it in the middle into a 2 foot hole with foundation at the bottom? Also I would rather make the ceiling the entrance, because I imagine cutting concrete greatly reduces it's strength, and may be impossible entirely, whereas a ceiling of my own design would be easy to work.

pic related, it's a similar design to mine I found online

Planned Specs:
>Inner diameter of 96" or 8', this allows me to lay across on the top "floor"
>Height of 8'-10' so the bottom floor is comfortable to stand up in, even under the ceiling holding up the bed
>Metal Ladder rungs attached to outside and a lockable hatch on the top to enter, also considered wrapping stairs around the outside to get up and in
My worries include electrics, plumbing (just use an outhouse? although I live in Texas), and that it could be knocked over by a tornado or teenagers... I am also worried somehow this is against the law, although I don't see how it could be, these are the safest materials to work with as long as the home is ventilated.

Help me perfect this? I am really passionate about creating it one day.

>>785697
That looks like a really nice prison cell.

>>785705
I'm into living in confined spaces like that, I slept in a bathroom for a few months - don't ask.

>>785697
Cutting concrete is easy, Home Depot and similar stores will even rent circular saws specifically for that. Dusty as fuck though.

The saw that I used once, cut 4 inches deep, so you could theoretically make smooth cuts through concrete thats 8-10 inches thick if you score both sides and bust out a sledgehammer.
So you don't necessarily have to use a top-down entrance.

Problems with concrete include poor insulation (maybe not so much since you say you're in texas), and you can't hide wiring or plumbing in the walls. Nailing stuff to concrete is also a pain in the ass, and an even bigger pain in the ass to adjust or fix things. Because you chip away at it and it's not as resilient as wood in that regard.

The other thing is, an 8 foot diameter concrete pipe might cost you almost as much as the materials for a nice cozy mini-house after you factor in the delivery fees - since you'll need a crane to position it.

There's a reason why houses with concrete basements cost less than "finished" basements - a stud wall is nicer to live in.

>>785697

Why concrete?
Do what these assholes are doing, but vertically with corrugated metal piping.

>>785715
Nigga gon look like he livin in a soup can

>>785707
>not using a wet concrete saw
Why do they even make dry ones? And those stupid ablative blades you need to replace every minute?

Search 'Earth Ship'

>>785715
That's what he was talking about though, the floor under the board is wasted space and you can't really use the walls compared to a shipping container or something similar.

>>785767
Anybody else notice the crab?

>>785775
I'd use it for storage. Just have a couple well placed trap doors.

>>785706
why did you sleep in a bathroom for months?

>>785723
>wet saw
Yeah man, i agree, but at the time a dry saw was like half the price of a wet one, and more compact for the space I was working in.

>>785479
>>785379
I thought it also had to do with long-term alterations to the water table and groundwater nature protection stuff. Same reason some/many/most(?) areas don't allow you to fuck with natural flowing rivers and streams without a LOT of very expensive paperwork and legal stuff.
Allowing people to collect rainwater is one logical step away from "Hurr, durr, the stream on my property is 'collected rainwater' so I should be able to do with it what i like."

Never mind that the same stream runs through half of your immediate neighbors' backyards, so damming it up for instance would alter the environment on land that doesn't belong to you.

>>785775
>>785798
Not totally wasted, it's a good place to run cables and piping through, both supply and drainage. Also, putting it horizontal lets you use WAY more space if you have a section longer than 12' or so, because even if you DID try in a vertical section, the space "savings" of the round floor would be taken up by ladder/stairs.

Also, drainage could be an issue for vertical pipe.

>>785865
I think it's all groundwater protection stuff. And it's because if rainwater is all collected then the water doesn't get as far, because instead of one flood filling the river in 3 hrs and then you have concentrated water with little surface area/volume, it takes 3 weeks while the water has a lot of surface area/volume, so more evaporates. So colorado water savers screw southern california.
Conversely, urban areas and stormwater collection drastically increase the water available downstream, which is why New Orleans got screwed. concrete levies to stop regular floods from chewing up the banks gave the storm surge momentum. The regular floods were because of storm water runoff upstream. That's harder to legislate against because it costs taxpayer money to fix and is against lobbyist interests.

>>785697
It might not be up to code because you would have like 78 sqft. I doubt they would count your loft idea as anything. That would be a lot of shit to pack into that. Like you said an outhouse thats cool with a septic tank as outhouse i would imagine. What you gonna do for bathing? The ole gym route? Water in, for a kitchen of sorts? You really gonna haul in water from spigot everytime ?. Your gonna need some sort of HVAC going on, between it being Texas, you subtlety breathing out moisture. And your dead skin falling off everywhere.

>>785462
That dome method doesn't seem very sound, concrete by itself has super poor sheering/tensile strength, and without steel reinforcement there I would think a dome (despite it being a strong shape) would collapse, especially at larger sizes.

>>785715
No insulation, going to be cold/hot as fuck in that human sized oven. Also seeing as the only place that guy can stand up straight is in the middle of the room, going to get very awkward very quickly.

>>785865
Ah yes that makes sense, hadn't thought of that.

>>785767
I like how your picture doesn't have anything to do with what you said. An earth ship is basically a hippy home, something that is made from as much environmentally sustainable products as possible with little waste, often made from rammed earth filled tires, using recycled cans/bottles for walls and stuff, with a lot of passive design put into it (sun/wind directions used to maximise heating in winter and cooling in summer)

>>785697
>>785715
I'll dump some of my small home pictures. I too don't like the hipster trend of living in a crappy wooden trailer, but when done right, a small home is a pretty nice thing. building a small home on a big plot of land is annoying to me, but it works for tiny apartments and crowded cities.

>>786027

>>786055

>>786056

>>786058

>>785914
I was hoping some experts here could help me come to a resting place on what to do for water, ventilation, and power because I'm not sure right now.

I was thinking get water in/out for a sink, but that's it and run power too, both through the floor. I guess the gym route works, but I might also build a nearby log-cabin style sauna building for showering
>that plan is on the DISTANT horizon though

>>786059
>>786060
Was this the picture that gave you the inspiration?

>>786061

>>786062
>>786060
A different setup.

>>786063
Think this is the last one.

>>786061
Initially yeah, and then I thought a little bit more in depth about staying in one long term.

>>786063
I considered this model and then thought it would less useful for living alone because I'd have to leave the building to get from kitchen to bedroom or whatever, which is not something I want to do.

I think if it's too difficult though, I would be willing to leave my pipe to go to the bathroom/shower.

>>786065
It could work. Could have a mixture of them some on their sides, some standing up. The problem with standing up ones is you can't really increase the room size, where as ones on their side can be as long as you want (but as you mentioned, there is a lot of wasted space because of the curves) In the end shipping container homes would probably be easier, and some of them don't look too bad.

>>786064
Where's the shower you fucking scrub? 0/10. You fucking suck.

>>786072
>implying I designed it.
Everyone always brings that up.
Shower could easily be in the room with the toilet, it's not as unusual as you think.

>>786073
It's clearly not if you look at the picture. There's no shower head in that room. Are you gonna sit on the toilet while you shower? No. Don't post it again queerbait.

stop having clones in sun hats and white shirts

>>786074
Is part of the wall cutaway? Yes, it could be there, and people shower sitting down all the time. This isn't /b/ you don't have to act like an internet tough guy here.

I'm not saying it's a perfect design, there is a lot of wasted space, you could easily move some of that furniture a little and have a separate shower room right next to the toilet, it's just an idea, a concept, no one is forcing you to live there, calm down bro.

>>786077
Also, no storage for food, or refrigeration - if you get delivery every day, that's not much of a hideout.

Also no plumbing depicted. That deep underground, you will be below city sewer lines, so you can't connect to them directly, same deal with an ordinary septic tank.

Also, you'll need some sort of sump pump or drainage system for getting rid of groundwater if it ever rains there, or you'll flood.

>>785841
dude he said dont ask

Hey quick semi-unrelated question: What are the laws on how deep you can dig a foundation? It's always been a dream of mine to construct a double basement, which would go at least 20 feet down.

>>786122
It depends where you live, not only what country, but what state, even what plot of land (depending if they have services running through your property) only way to find out is to contact your local council

>>786105
You really are stupid aren't you?

" If you need a starting point, go to Barnes & Nobel and find a book on carpentry in their DIY/self help section and git gud. "

IMO Check the Used Books Stores.

My LIbraries here are crap and even checked a few college Libraries.

But the USED Book store has lots of good ones.

I'm not half way yet, but have been comparing Log Cabins and Concrete & Brick Buildings with Cysterns built it filled by city delivery truck or once a week by push from city water and have Bottle Water delivered to the house for drinking.

Many concrete houses in third world have bottom floor as a utility area or garage or a shelter for animals. I like the idea of a 10-12 foot high brick and Plaster High Wall around my Home and maybe a private back yard that way.

Lots of Pluming done first with the Electric plan and decide what kind of heat and hot water.

But you can just buy a quick heat unit for the Bath area and avoid a full hot water tank.

Cabins today often have well water and septic tanks and the owner can wait to put in the septic and Electricity. Even here in the USA.

>>786122
Just read something about how you can not refill in the dirt or clay when digging. This leaves a Drainage Problem.

How are you going to drain water from 20 feet down?

>>787274
Not him, but most homes in my city are built with pumps because of all the spring melt.

>>785149

Thinking about giving one of these a try
>http://www.truelog.com/menu.htm

There is an area I want to move to but I could never afford a house there. However I could afford to buy land there and one of these log home kits without too much sweat.

>>785149
Google a fuckton of shit about how to build a house. Then work for about 10 years in construction, and then employ some builders to build a house with a fuckton of skills you havent mastered in 10 years, or OR OR!!!!! you can wanna build a house when you are 20 and work in construction for 60 years and master every skill you need. Remember - a jack of all trades is a master of none

>>787300
>Remember - a jack of all trades is a master of none
this is so painful

>>787300
Well, living in Russia, in some parts basicly have no restrictions or whatsoever unlike the facist USA. Last summer for 3 months, me and my father build 2 story house with basement and underground garage for 2 cars + upper half just for workshop stuff and basic car repairs. It costed us $ 10,000, we were the only workers, we hired when we needed big cranes and bulldozers and stuff like that, we paid for the materials and paid like $ 300 to an engeneer and architect to make it all legal.

It still need interior finishig, furniture and stuff like that, but its all done. Maybe this summer we will finish it completly for another 10k or so.

Its not that hard, when you build with concrete and bircks.

>>787326
thats why we pity you guys and send you our charity money when your 12 storey hovels collapse and kill people

>>785379
because someone downstream probably already owns the water rights, so collecting rainwater would be theft..

>>787300
Speaking from experience - you can pick up ALL the relevant skills, in about ten years.

Some things (sheetrock, taping, painting) have a really short learning curve.

In a lot of others, the difference "competent" and "master" is entirely concerned with things you won't need to build a simple house. An expert framer can calculate all the cut angles on a really complicated roof really quickly: but unless you're building a McMansion, you don't need to know how to do that. A master electrician knows how to wire commercial and industrial, as well as residential - but in a simple house, you won't need to know any of that. A master Plumber knows how many stories height he can run a stack before needing to put in offsets, knows how big a pipe he needs to vent whatever fixture you can name... you're not going to need to know any of that, and what you need you can google. An experienced trim carpenter can put up 8-inch-wide stain-grade crown molding with the seams so tight that there's no need to caulk, and judge which inside corners to cope so as to allow for movement, and cope it perfectly on the 1st try, quickly and efficiently... any monkey can run basic trim so it looks passable after some caulk & paint. And so on.

>>785388

Where I live you can't build a deck attached to your house without several permits and submitting plans and shit.

So to get around that I just have steps that go down to the ground, then steps that got up to a "raised platform" thats like 3 feet from my house. I just filled in the areas between with garden beds and they can't do shit because it isn't connected to the house. I'm considering building a little bridge to avoid going up and down.

I'm not worried about neighbors since they're like 10 minutes away, however when I was building it someone reported me and I had to deal with all kinds of bullshit for a while. We almost went to court over it until they're lawyer actually read the bylaws and fucked off.